A Life In Fragments
by Corvus corone
Summary: Luna Koizumi is almost universally hated, but her life has never been easy. Contains slight Luna/Yuka if you squint. Based on the latest chapters of Yuka's past.
1. Chapter 1

**A Life In Fragments**

xxx

**1.**

When Luna was eleven, she accidentally bit someone in a fight (never being one of the popular girls who wore makeup and did their nails, the boys liked to include her in their playground battles) and left a black bruise mark on his arm. She said sorry to him like a good girl - even though she knew he liked having a cool bite-scar to show off - after her parents yelled at her, and thought no more of it.

It was perhaps two weeks later, a day or so after the boy had been taken into hospital, when the men came to her house.

**2.**

They said that she would fit in here.

It didn't feel much like fitting in. Luna only had to take one step into the room before the pack of noisy girls suddenly went death-quiet, and she only had to sit down at their table before they started eying her with nervous glances and shift to give her a wide berth. Was that fear in their eyes? She fingered her restraining earrings and bracelet and wondered what it was she could do to them.

They said that she had a great power, one that needed to be treated with special care and caution. The attraction of souls, they said. They didn't say how she was to use it or what it really meant.

She let her messy, overlong bangs fall into her eyes only so they could hide her tears.

**3.**

A few months had passed before the new girl came. The giggling girls now ignored Luna when she entered the room, although they still refused to talk to her and would back away when she walked past. She heard their frightened whispers, how she would suck out their soul if they touched her, how she was so dangerous her own parents had abandoned her.

Luna first noticed the new girl some time after she had come (there were so many new pupils coming in that she hadn't really taken much notice before, and besides, they would all treat her like the others did in the end). She watched her from the doorways, from the back of the class, and noticed pretty her chestnut-brown hair was, how she hadn't yet been sucked into The Group, how she liked to quietly study rather than gossip about Yuki-sensei.

**4.**

Luna had just managed to work up the courage to approach Yuka when The Group bustled her away, chattering about how exciting Valentine's Day was. As Luna turned to leave, she heard their all-too-loud whispers warning Yuka to stay away from her, and felt the old tears stinging her eyes. She wiped them away, and promised herself that she would find Yuka again, somewhere where The Group couldn't hear her, and Yuka would understand. Wouldn't she?

How strange it was that a simple nod could change her world so utterly and completely!

**5.**

Luna, for the first time since she had come to this place, was happy. There was nothing, nothing that anyone else could say, do or give her, that she loved more than the pure joy of being near Yuka. She hung on to her every word and every action, and her only thought was how to spend more time with her. For once, she was glad of the fear she inspired in the other pupils - it meant no-one else would come near them.

The Group shook their heads and muttered about how nothing good would ever come of it, but Luna didn't care. She had no emotion left for caring about them; now, every smile and every moment was for Yuka and Yuka alone.

**6.**

Luna didn't notice that Yuka was hardly as happy to see her as she was to see Yuka. She didn't understand, or want to understand, why Yuka wore heavy scarves and hoods that covered her face and purposely darted away when Luna followed her down the corridors. Nor could she see or understand why Yuka never tried to share _her_ bed, or stick with _her_ every moment of every day, or tell _her_ that she loved her at every possible opportunity. No, she was too deep in her own Yuka-centric world to notice - or maybe she just didn't want to. Instead, she just clung closer as she attempted to avoid losing her.

**7.**

Principal Kuonji was the first one to ever tell her that her Alice was beautiful. He told her that she didn't deserve to be treated like she was, that The Group were just jealous of the power of her Alice. He promised her that she would now be able to train her Alice and one day, she would be far above those fools who treated her like trash. Luna listened with wide eyes and waited for that day.

Of course she trusted him. Not even Yuka had ever said those things to her, as much as Luna had longed for it. When the other girls turned away from her rather than listen to her, instead of crying or reaching for Yuka's hand, Luna thought of what she could do to them with a fully developed Alice.

**8.**

Middle School was not what Luna had hoped for.

What had she thought before? A new start, the chance to finally be a "proper" member of Alice Academy. Now that she was allowed to wander the wide halls of Hii-sama's world, Luna had thought she would at last be accepted as part of this school. But in the end, nothing had changed. Yuka didn't understand, but perhaps that was because she wasn't really listening.

It hurt Luna more than anything to know that Yuka didn't really want to be with her. No matter how hard Luna held onto her, she couldn't really overlook it any more.

**9.**

One day, after completely a particularly gruelling duty, Principal Kuonji came to the Dangerous classroom and told her how proud he was of her Alice. She had now developed full control over a most powerful Alice, he said, and Luna smiled at him. Now those girls would see who had the best Alice!

Later that evening, she sneaked into Yuka's bedroom and told her the good news. Yuka shouted at her to stop trying to sleep with her and Luna felt a little disappointed.

**10.**

Luna did not often have fights. It was either because the other person was so scared of her Alice they would turn and run at the first possible moment, or because the other person was Yuka and Luna would forgive her for anything. No, Luna would _never_ start a fight with Yuka.

So it was quite surprising, really, when it happened. Luna had thought Yuka might understand - after all, didn't Yuka have that kind of Alice too? Even though they never talked about it, it was common knowledge that the Stealing Alice was almost as hated as the Soul-Sucking one. It was only Yuka's general _niceness _and friendship with Yukihira-sensei that kept her from being as detested as Luna.

And it wasn't even a proper fight. Luna had just been about to demonstrate how powerful how Alice had become (and who better to try it on than one of those stupid girls that even now, still insisted on treating her like some sort of disgusting bug?) when a blinding flash of _something_ had knocked her onto her stomach. A terrible feeling of nausea, and then nothing. The place inside her where her Alice had been - nothing.

Yes, the Stealing Alice was hated. For good reason, too.

xxx

_Will probably be another (longer?) installment of this. I'm really sorry that I haven't been getting on with the challenges, but I feel like I need to write something a bit different, you know? Otherwise the challenges are just going to get boring and stale._

_Oh yes, and the wonderful IndigoGrapefuit has drawn a picture of Princessessa Melonbeauty (if you don't know her, read "Gakuen Alice Fanfic"), so please visit her profile to see that._

_And I've also drawn two portraits of Melonbeauty! Go to my livejournal or deviantART to view (one anime-style, one realistic-style so you can compare and contrast).  
_


	2. Chapter 2

_A/N: I WILL do requested challenges. I will. I promise. :P_

**11.**

How strange it was that just a few seconds could change her world so utterly and completely!

Yuka, her best friend, her _only_ friend, had betrayed her in the worst possible way - she had tried to steal (no, _had _stolen) Luna's most precious possession, the only thing that gave her any power in front of those other stupid girls. Luna gaped for a few stunned moments, not quite believing what had just happened. Yuka would never...

But her soul was empty now, no Alice within it, and there was a glittering purple Stone in Yuka's hand.

"What did you do to me?!"

**12.**

Luna would never, never, _ever _forgive Yuka. That, she was certain about.

Now that she thought about it, it wasn't just that Stealing incident. Look what else Yuka had done to her - stolen Principal Kuonji's attentions, for one thing. That Principal had been the only person to ever acknowledge anything good about Luna's Alice, had been the only person to tell her that she was worth anything, and now Yuka just had to take that away from her as well.

And deep inside, Luna had always known that Yuka hadn't _really _wanted to be friends with her before. Luna let the memories resurface, and instead of pushing away those thoughts of rejection when Yuka had _not _hugged her back or had _not _wanted to be her gym partner, she embraced them. If Yuka didn't want to be her friend, then why should she be hers?

She wiped away some stray tears (how had they come about?) and resolved to punish Yuka.

**13.**

She told herself she was happy. She had friends now, didn't she? Even if they were mindless idiots whose every move she controlled, thanks to those little bite marks on their necks, she had friends. Because they were not Yuka, Luna felt no guilt about Soul-Sucking those girls into talking to her or sitting with her at break or baking her Valentine's Day cakes.

(She didn't ask herself why Yuka would be an exception.)

And just as Luna had friends, or at least some semblance of friends, Yuka had no such thing. Those girls in The Group who had been so adamant in "protecting" Yuka from her all those years ago, well, Luna had turned them all over to her side a long time ago. Having learnt from her own experiences, Luna knew exactly how to make Yuka feel as she herself had felt long ago. Now Yuka should feel the real consequences of daring to Steal her Alice!

**14.**

Yukihira-sensei was nice to her. Luna liked him - or rather, she would have liked him if he hadn't been so attatched to Yuka, of all people. Something inside her made her insides grimace at the thought of him being all protective and wonderful and _nice_ to that stupid girl, and it was in those moments that she wished he didn't have a Nullification Alice so she could Soul-Suck him and make him walk off a cliff.

There had been that conversation just before he broke into Principal Kuonji's office to "heroically" rescue poor, _poor _Yuka.

What had he said? Oh yes, something about "your love is as deep as your hate" and how Luna really needed to get over this quarrel because she really did like Yuka an awful lot somewhere very deep down. That kind of stuff.

Perhaps Luna would have considered those things a little more, if it hadn't been so very obvious that Yukihira-sensei really wanted to rescue Yuka rather than talk to Luna. _Why _was everything always about Yuka?

**15.**

She didn't look at Yuka when they passed each other in the corridor. In any case, Luna knew what she would see - a sad-looking girl who wouldn't meet anyone's eyes, not even Yukihira-sensei's. It was funny, really, how their positions had reversed. So let Yuka be Principal Kuonji's favourite; Luna was determined not to care any more about that.

And yet, it was impossible for her _not_ to care. Yuka, everything she had done, being Principal Kuonji's special one, Yukihira-sensei... they came to her in those restless spaces before sleep, and she couldn't get them out of her head. Whether it was happiness, sadness, anger - she couldn't tell any more, but it was there all the same.

**16.**

She didn't look at Yuka, she didn't talk to Yuka, and she tried to pretend that Yuka didn't exist, but she couldn't help thinking about Yuka anyway. Yuka had got new friends now - that Narumi kid who was two years younger than her, school-President-Shiki and finally Kaoru Igarashi, a High Schooler.

Out of all of them, Luna hated Kaoru the most. What did Kaoru have that she didn't? And how _dare _she be friends with Yuka of all people? A stab of anger twisted her stomach every time Luna thought of Kaoru's pretty face or the disgusting crimson shade of her eyes or how she had walked arm in arm with Yuka down the corridor that morning.

Perhaps it wasn't the fact that Kaoru liked Yuka that Luna hated her for - after all, Narumi and Shiki liked her just as much, even more - it was that Yuka reciprocated it.

**17.**

There were rumours everywhere. Some of them said that Yuka was Principal Kuonji's lover, some said that she was actually engaged to Shiki the handsome school captain, and some said that even Narumi, the Pheromone Alice who everyone hated and who hated everyone, was in love with her. It was a mystery to everyone why Yuka seemed to always be at the centre of these love circles, and there were rumours about that as well.

There were some about Luna as well, but no-one dared to say anything in front of her for fear of being Soul-Sucked.

**18.**

Yuka's new friends - Luna watched them as their laughter slowly faded, while Yuka seemed oblivious to their discomfort. Really, someone had to tell Yuka, didn't they? Luna decided she might as well. She wasn't sure whether she wanted to tell Yuka because it was for her own good, or because she wanted to destroy her happy bubble and wipe that clear bright smile off her face. Yuka had never smiled like to _her_.

**19.**

So those rumours about Principal Kuonji were partly true, then?

Marriage. Luna felt an icy needle of _something _prick her when she heard that proposal. He couldn't be serious... and besides, Yuka wouldn't say yes. She wouldn't. She couldn't.

Anyway, why was she even listening to this? She didn't care about Yuka and what Yuka chose to do with her sad little life. No, she'd grown out of standing by the door, listening to Yuka's life from the outside. She turned to leave before she heard Yuka answer him _(she said no, she must have said no)_.

**20.**

Kaoru graduated and Luna smiled. Finally, that annoying girl was leaving the school for good, and Yuka would have one less friend to keep her happy. Although Luna had no intention of attempting to repair her friendship with Yuka, she hated the thought of Kaoru taking her place as "Yuka's best friend", and hated the thought of Yuka actually _welcoming _it even more. Pathetic, really. Just another four years in this place, and then she wouldn't have to think about Yuka any more...

**TBC**

_A/N: Aaaaaaand that's as far as the manga has reached. I won't write any more until I know what Tachibana Higuchi is going to do with Luna/Yuka/Kaoru's lives after this point. :)_


End file.
